


Winged Debacle

by OurLadyOnTheOtherSide



Series: BattleKing Trope Trip [1]
Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: BattleKing, F/F, First Kiss, Fluff, Wingfic, kady knows what she wants and what she wants is margo, margo is a useless wlw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-18
Updated: 2018-11-18
Packaged: 2019-08-25 14:02:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,541
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16662313
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OurLadyOnTheOtherSide/pseuds/OurLadyOnTheOtherSide
Summary: On her back are a pair of glorious, feathered, pale pink wings. Margo crosses her arms and raises her chin.“Holy fuck.” Kady breathes, closing the door behind her and walking toward Margo.“I don’t know how it happened but I need it to un-happen right the fuck now.” Margo says.





	Winged Debacle

Kady walks into her room and screams in shock. As soon as she steps across the threshold a rabbit appears in front of her feet. She gets only a moment to shake out the surprise before the rabbit says, “Need help. Margo.”

Kady narrows her eyes, wonders if the rabbit ended up in the wrong place by accident because why would Margo need her help? When another rabbit appears in the room and says in its rough voice, “Please Kady.”

Then Kady realizes that the problem must be really unique if Margo really does need her. Perhaps something that needs breaking through? Perhaps Margo needs a Battle Magician she can trust. So Kady throws on a jacket and finds her way to Fillory. 

 

Kady finds Margo in one of the unused rooms in Whitespire. Or rather, she finds Margo hiding. Kady had been asking around and looking in almost every room until she called into one and Margo responded. 

“Why are you hiding?” Kady asks as she walks into the room. It looks to be storage, furniture and discarded clothes scattering the space. From what she could tell, Margo was hiding behind a drab looking room divider. 

“You can’t laugh.” Margo says, not answering the question, “And you can’t tell anyone.” 

“I won’t. Just tell me why you’re hiding.” Kady tries not to smile. 

She can hear Margo sigh, and then she steps out from behind the divider. 

Kady gasps. 

On her back are a pair of glorious, feathered, pale pink wings. Margo crosses her arms and raises her chin. 

“Holy fuck.” Kady breathes, closing the door behind her and walking toward Margo. 

“I don’t know how it happened but I need it to un-happen right the fuck now.” Margo says. 

“Calm down, I’ll help you fix this.” Kady smiles. 

“Thank you.” Margo says. 

They move over to one of the old couches and Kady runs her hands lightly over the wings. “When did this happen?” 

“Earlier today.” Margo shivers. 

“And you weren’t doing any spells? You didn’t have Josh cook you anything?” Kady asks. 

Margo shakes her head, “No. I’ve been dealing with the million things I need to do to run this goddamn country.” 

“Okay.” Kady says, moving her hands away from the feathers to hold up her thumb and forefingers in a square to check if they have any magical residue on them. “They don’t look dangerous.” 

“Dangerous? You thought they’d look dangerous?” Margo says surprised, then, “Jesus! I didn’t even think about that. You think someone could have done this to me? Some son of a bitch cast a hex on me? I bet it was that motherfucking farmer from the other day- he had a bad feeling to him.” 

Margo whips around while she’s talking to look at Kady while she rants. Kady just smiles, “Calm down. You’re fine. But I do think this is a Brakebills problem.”

“No, Kady, I don’t want anyone to see me like this.” Margo says, “I already have one eye, with wings I’m a freak show.” 

“Well, it’s either go to Brakebills to talk to Professor Lipson or you stay here and keep the wings.” Kady reasons. 

“Fuck.” Margo looks away, groans, turns back to Kady and says, “Okay,  _fine_ , but we’re going straight to Lipson and praying that none of those judgmental first year fuckers see me.”

“Okay.” Kady laughs. 

 

They get to Brakebills quickly and although Margo has large wings on her back, an eye patch, a crown, and a dark pink dress on that looks like it’s from a renaissance fair, no one really bats an eye at her as they walk down the short sidewalk to Lipson’s office. Kady thinks it has something to do with the fact that Margo walks with her head high, as if she would be unaffected by anyone’s glances even if they did dare to look. Margo has a dangerous look in her eye as well, a look that warns everyone that she has the power to fuck them up and will gladly do so. Kady guesses this is why she’s so feared and loved in Fillory. 

Professor Lipson gasps in shock when they walk into her office. 

Once she gets over the sight, she sets to work with her many magical lenses to see what’s happened to Margo to cause this. The prognosis is, thankfully, good. Kady stands in the background with her arms crossed and listens as Lipson tells them that it’s a random affliction that happens every once and a while to people in Fillory. Nothing to be worried about, they’ll shed in a couple days, but until then Kady would have to take care of her, make sure she was okay and the wings didn’t develop something worse. Then she gave them some sort of balm and sent them on their way. 

When they get back to Whitespire and Margo’s room, she falls down in a huff and pouts. 

“What now?” Kady asks. 

“How am I going to show myself? ‘A couple days’, what does that even mean?” Margo sighs. 

“I’ve never seen you this self-conscious.” Kady remarks. 

“Usually I’m not. But they’re wings, Kady.” Margo says, “My eye I could handle, the eyepatches also help, but wings? How am I gonna hide these? How is this going to look for all my subjects?” 

“Badass? Because everything on you looks badass?” Kady offers. 

Margo tries to glare, slightly rolls her eyes, but can’t help but smile too, “I’ll be a laughing stock.” 

“They love you too much to laugh at you. And if they don’t love you enough then they certainly fear you enough.” Kady says. 

Margo groans, “You’re right.” She turns to a mirror in her room and examines her wings, “I guess they are kind of pretty.” 

“And, you know, you could probably fly.” Kady points out. 

Margo’s eyes light up. 

 

Flying, it turns out, is harder than it sounds. Margo finds that, while she can stretch out her wings and move them, she doesn’t yet possess the skills to move them quick enough to gather wind or lift herself. They end up on the top of Whitespire’s North tower, under the heat of the Fillorian summer sun, feeling defeated.

“Well… now what?” Kady asks. 

Margo groans, “I think I have a meeting with Tick in a couple minutes.” 

“Is Fillory in trouble?” 

“When is it not?” Margo raises an eyebrow and Kady laughs. 

After her laughter dies down Kady bites her lip and looks at Margo strangely for a moment before saying, “Don’t go to the meeting.” 

“Why?” Margo tilts her head, leans back on her hands. 

“Because instead you could be showing me around your glorious kingdom.” Kady says. 

Margo narrows her eyes just slightly, wants to ask,  _are you flirting with me?_ but decides she probably isn’t and instead says, “That sounds like fun.” 

 

Margo doesn’t actually know what the place is called. If Quentin were here he’d probably prattle on and on about how it was made, what it’s called, how it served such and such purpose in whichever book it was and how Martin or Jane or Rupert came here for  _this_ reason and this was where  _this_ happened, and eventually Margo would tune him out or tell him to shut up. Sure, she’d read and loved the books just like any other kid, but she didn’t remember the details as intensely as he did and anyway, she’d just been walking on a particularly bad day, trying to take a break from all the chaos and responsibility of the castle when she stumbled upon it. Then it became her secret sanctuary.

Getting to the small waterfall Margo had found is harder with wings. They snag on branches and brush past leaves and generally get in the way, to the point Margo wants to tear them out because they’re so goddamn annoying. Thankfully, Kady is there to help. She moves through the dense forest with ease and moves branches out of the way for Margo, making sure she can make it through without anything hitting her. Margo thinks briefly how Kady, in this moment, is like her knight in shining armor, helping her run away from the castle through the dangerous forests. 

They reach the base of a waterfall and Kady gasps. It’s beautiful. Clear water cascading like diamonds down into the large pool they stand before now. Margo loved this place. The water in the pool was clear, and still enough to see the several colorful fishes and other aquatic animals native to Fillory. If she leaned close enough, as she did sometimes, she could see other creatures deeper down- human like ones that Margo thought to be nymphs of some kind, or something similar. She does this now, standing at the edge of the water and leaning over just enough to look down. She wonders if whatever creatures are down there are looking up at her, with her large wings, and wondering what kind of winged human was looking down at them. 

“How’d you even find this place?” Kady asks, causing Margo to pull back and tune into the conversation. 

“I stumbled upon it one day. And anyway, this isn’t the part I wanted to show you.” Margo says, taking Kady’s hand to tug her along the path. 

The top of the waterfall was hidden by the trees way high up. Attempting to climb the side of it to get to the top would take too long, so Margo leads her around a shortcut that’s easier to climb. As they make their way up they help each other, Margo pulling Kady up in places Kady is having trouble and Kady holding aside branches that would get caught on Margo’s wings. At the end of it they’re both sweating, and they collapse on the top of the stones of the waterfall next to the loud rushing water. 

Margo sits up after she catches her breath and looks out at the view. From here, the waterfall is higher than the trees and gives a grand view of the sunset. A few moments later Kady sits up too and whistles. 

“I didn’t know Fillory could be so pretty.” She says. 

Margo nods, pulls her knees up to her chest, and looks out at all of it. “Sometimes I forget that I’m the ruler of it all. Sometimes I forget how big Fillory is.” Margo pauses a moment before adding, “It’s like the Lion King.” 

“What?” Kady asks. 

“‘Everything the light touches’.” Margo smiles when she looks over at Kady, “I rule over it all.” 

Kady laughs lightly. 

It’s in that little moment afterword, in that minute of silence that seems to last far longer than merely 60 seconds, that Margo wonders for the second time whether Kady might be interested in her. As they stare at each other, Kady seems to soften, her hard edges slipping away for a moment, and bathed in the setting sunlight, she seems to have a glow about her. 

It is both surprising and unsurprising when Kady puts a hand on her cheek and pulls her in for a kiss. 

Margo has kissed a lot of people, giving her experiences that range from awful to holy-fuck-wow, so she can say with quite certainty that kissing Kady is somewhere along the lines of breathing?-what’s that?- limbs?- I don’t think I ever had them. In short, Margo melts. Completely. Perhaps it’s just that she’s been in Fillory for so long and hasn’t gotten much action at all, but she thinks she might die if Kady doesn’t pull her closer and run her hands all over her body. 

That doesn’t happen, and Margo doesn’t die when they pull away, though she is disappointed. Kady runs a hand through her own hair and smiles at Margo in a,  _was that okay?_ kind of way. Margo just smiles back. 

 

Three days later Kady is awoken by Margo’s screams. She runs to Margo’s side, finds her with her arms wrapped around her torso while her wings bleed around their base and the feathers fall off in sheets. Margo is on her knees by her bed, as if she had been in the middle of getting up to go somewhere when the pain started. Kady puts one hand on her arm and wipes Margo’s tears away with the other. 

“Breathe.” Kady advises. 

Margo looks like she’s about to bite off a witty insult or remark but instead she just nods and tries to do just that. Margo cries out again, closing her eyes against the pain. This must have been what Professor Lipson meant when she said the wings would shed, Margo just wasn’t expecting it to hurt so much. Or at all. 

“What do you need me to do?” Kady asks, and she looks frantic. 

“Just be here with me.” Margo says. 

So Kady stays, moves in closer so Margo can grip her forearms and rest her head on Kady’s shoulder as the pain rips through her. Kady soothes down her hair with one hand while her other one rests on her side. Margo finds strength in her. When the pain had started she had wished that Eliot or Quentin were there just to sit with her through it but her second thought had been Kady. And Margo can tell that she wants to do more to help, would fight the root cause of the pain with her bare fists, because like Margo, Kady understood problem solving through violence and brute force, but for the moment it’s enough for Margo that Kady is just there, holding her. 

The pain is nearly unbearable, the most awful thing she’s experienced in her life thus far. It’s like roots burrowed into her back trying to come free, being pulled out of her skin still buried deep. They stay together like that, Margo gripping Kady like a lifeline, for about an hour, at the end of which her back is sore and her wings are gone. 

They’d shed their feathers before falling out of her bleeding back and now lay on the floor. Kady had gotten up when it was over to retrieve a rag and a bowl of water, as well as the balm Lipson gave them, before returning, at which point Margo collapses into Kady, breathing heavily. Kady holds her while using one hand to slowly and gently stop the bleeding and clean away the blood. 

After she finishes she helps Margo back onto her bed, laying her down on her stomach, and cleaning up the bloody rags before coming back to rub the balm on her back— which turns out to help soothe the soreness and quicken the healing. And then Kady sits on the bed, leaning against the headboard, and stroking Margo’s hair until she falls asleep. Kady stays to watch over her until the morning. 

 

“Thank you.” Margo says when she wakes, “For being here through all that.” 

Kady smiles at her, “Any time.” 

In all, the experience isn't something Margo can say she loved, but it does bring her and Kady closer. Her winged debacle creates a trust and a bond with Kady that Margo doesn't think would have come around otherwise, but is glad for it all the same. 


End file.
